Method and apparatus for signaling transmission code set in data broadcasting

ABSTRACT

A method of decoding character strings within a message to reference data is provided. The method includes receiving the message to reference the data transmitted by an object carousel, wherein the message is a broadcast inter ORB protocol (BIOP) message, determining information regarding an encoding system used to encode the character strings within the message; and decoding the character strings according to the information which is determined.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This is a continuation of application Ser. No. 11/125,258 filed May 10,2005, the entire disclosure application Ser. No. 11/125,258 of which isconsidered part of the disclosure of the accompanying continuationapplication and is hereby incorporated by reference. This applicationclaims priority from Korean Patent Application No. 10-2004-0077204 filedon Sept. 24, 2004 in the Korean Intellectual Property Office, KoreanPatent Application No. 10-2005-0017361 filed on Mar. 2, 2005 in theKorean Intellectual Property Office, Korean Patent Application No.10-2005-0017362 filed on Mar. 2, 2005 in the Korean IntellectualProperty Office, and U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 60/603,564filed on Aug. 24, 2004 in the United States Patent and Trademark Office,the disclosures of which are incorporated herein by reference in theirentirety.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of the Invention

The present invention relates to an apparatus for and a method ofsignaling a transmission code set, and more particularly, to anapparatus for and a method of signaling a transmission code set fornaming pathnames by using various languages in transferring data about acharacter encoding system of a pathname in an object carousel message.

2. Description of the Related Art

Digital broadcasting is an advanced broadcasting technology thatperforms bi-directional data transfer, and reproduction and storage ofdata differently from analog broadcasting. In digital broadcasting, TVsignals are compressed and broadcast as digital signals in which codeddata signals are recorded. Since the number of signals than can betransferred via digital broadcasting is six times larger than in analogbroadcasting, the resolution of signals in digital broadcasting is atleast twice as high as in analog broadcasting. Also, because a digitalradio signal can store a plurality of image and audio files, six toeight channels can be operated in the same bandwidth in digitalbroadcasting, in contrast to one channel in analog broadcasting. Assuch, digital broadcasting has become a core technology of theinformation era, by which image and audio files can be compressed andtransferred and various signals can be modulated by using computer-basedcommunication technologies. Accordingly, a TV in digital broadcasting istransformed from a traditionally passive device into an activemultimedia device.

Data broadcasting, the main element of digital broadcasting, is thecontinuous transfer of digital/multimedia broadcasting contents, inaddition to image files, sound files, software applications, andstreaming of data to an information processing apparatus, such as a PC,a digital set top box, and a personal portable terminal. Databroadcasting does not require a return path, and the informationprocessing apparatus receives contents without requesting them. Thus,data broadcasting is a highly advanced technology combining broadcastingmethods, communication methods, and the Internet to transferbi-directional multimedia contents at a very high speed. Therefore, databroadcasting can solve the one way property and simplicity ofconventional analog broadcasting and limitations concerning imagequality, tone quality, and Internet capacity broadcasting.

Examples of digital broadcasting systems include the Advanced TelevisionSystems Committee (ATSC) system used in the U.S. and the Digital VideoBroadcasting-Terrestrial (DVB-T) system used in Europe as ground wavereceiving systems, and the OpenCable system used in the U.S. and theDVB-Cable (DVB-C) system used in Europe as cable receiving systems.Examples of a middle ware technology for digital broadcasting includethe DVB-Multimedia Home Platform (DVB-MHP), the OpenCable ApplicationPlatform (OCAP), and the Advanced Common Application Platform (ACAP).The DVB-MHP is a middle ware system for a European digital TV designedby the DVB project. The OCAP is a middle ware system for a digital cabletelevision set top box and other digital devices adopted by cablecompanies in the U.S. The ACAP has been designed to unify the OCAP usedin cable broadcasting and the Digital TV Application SoftwareEnvironment (DASE) used in ground wave broadcasting.

The DVB-MHP, OCAP, and ACAP use an object carousel defined by theISO-IEC 13818-6 standard. The object carousel uses a Common ObjectRequest Broker Architecture (CORBA) string defined in the CORBA/IIOP 2.1specification, in order to exchange a pathname component, which is usedto name data, directories, and files. In addition, when characterencoding data is not specified in the CORBA string, the object carouseluses the ISO 8859-1 (ISO Latin 1) standard for the encoding system.Accordingly, these middle ware technologies using the object carouseluse the ISO 8859-1 standard for a basic encoding system for namingpathnames, files, and directories. However, the DVB-MHP, the OCAP, andthe ACAP support only Latin languages for the pathnames, and thus it isimpossible to represent the pathnames by using another language.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The present invention provides a method of and an apparatus forreporting information about an encoding system to represent pathnames byusing various languages in a system using an object carousel.

According to an aspect of the present invention, there is provided amethod of decoding character strings within a message to reference data,the method including: receiving the message to reference the datatransmitted by an object carousel, wherein the message is a broadcastinter ORB protocol (BIOP) message; determining information regarding anencoding system used to encode the character strings within the message;and decoding the character strings according to the information which isdetermined.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The above and other aspects of the present invention will become moreapparent by describing in detail exemplary embodiments thereof withreference to the attached drawings in which:

FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating the concept of a DSM-CC model;

FIG. 2 illustrates a DVB service including an object carousel spectrum;

FIG. 3 illustrates the format of a BIOP message;

FIG. 4 illustrates the format of ServiceGatewayInfo() of adownloadServerInitiate (DSI) message;

FIG. 5 illustrates the format of a BIOP::DirectoryMessage;

FIG. 6 illustrates the format of a BIOP::FileMessage;

FIG. 7 is a block diagram of a server according to an exemplaryembodiment of the present invention;

FIG. 8 is a block diagram of a client according to an exemplaryembodiment of the present invention; and

FIG. 9 is a flowchart illustrating a method of signaling a transmissioncode set according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF EXEMPLARY EMBODIMENTS OF THE INVENTION

The present invention and methods of accomplishing the same may beunderstood more readily by reference to the following detaileddescription of exemplary embodiments and the accompanying drawings. Thepresent invention may, however, be embodied in many different forms andshould not be construed as being limited to the exemplary embodimentsset forth herein. Rather, these exemplary embodiments are provided sothat this disclosure will be thorough and complete and will fully conveythe concept of the invention to those skilled in the art, and thepresent invention will only be defined by the appended claims. Likereference numerals refer to like elements throughout the specification.

The present invention will now be described more fully with reference tothe accompanying drawings, in which exemplary embodiments of theinvention are shown.

The digital storage media command and control (DSM-CC) standard is a setof protocols providing control functions and operations for managingMPEG-1 and MPEG-2 bit streams to transmit multimedia broadband services.The concept of the object carousel has been defined in the DSM-CCstandard and reflected in a DVB specification, and then has been adoptedby DVB-MHP, OCAP, and ACAP as middle ware specification for digitalbroadcasting.

FIG. 1 illustrates the concept of a DSM-CC model.

In the DSM-CC model, streams generated by a server 120 are transmittedto a client 110, and both the server 120 and the client 110 are regardedas users. The client 110 is a set top box, a PC or a personal portableterminal which uses multimedia contents. The server 120 provides themultimedia contents and services. A network 130 denotes a set ofcommunication elements that provides connections between users. In FIG.1, a connection 136 for carrying user-to-network (U-N) data and aconnection 134 for carrying user-to-user (U-U) data are shown. U-Uinformation flow is used between a client and a server, and U-Ninformation flow is used between a network and a client or between anetwork and a server. The DSM-CC defines a logic entity, which isreferred to as a session and resource manager (SRM). In this case, anSRM 132 provides a centralized management of sessions and networkresources.

A DVB system provides the transmission of MPEG-2 transport streams (TS)through various transmission media by adopting the U-U connection fromthe DSM-CC specifications. The MPEG-2 TS includes an MPEG-2 video and anMPEG-2 audio. Data broadcasting is regarded as a major expansion of theMPEG-2 based DVB transmission standard. Examples of data broadcastinginclude software download via satellites, cables, or ground links, thetransmission of Internet services through broadcast channels, andinteractive TV. Data information may be transmitted while being includedin the MPEG-2 TS. Examples of a method of transmitting data informationinclude data piping, data streaming, multi-protocol encapsulation, datacarousel, and object carousel.

FIG. 2 illustrates a DVB service using an object carousel.

The object carousel defined by DSM-CC is a data structure supporting thetransmission of object groups from a broadcasting server using adirectory object, a file object, and a stream object to a broadcastingreceiver. In this case, real directories and contents are located in theserver. The object carousel specification supports a data broadcastingservice, which demands a periodical broadcasting of a DSM-CC U-U objectthrough a DVB compatible broadcast network. The server repeatedlyinserts the objects to the DVB compatible MPEG-2 TS according to theobject carousel protocol. Transmitted directories 210 and files 220include the contents of the objects, and transmitted streams 230 arereferences for other streams of the broadcasting. In addition, thestreams 230 may include information about DSM-CC events that arebroadcast in a specific stream. The DSM-CC events may be broadcast withordinary stream data and be used for triggering DSM-CC applications. Aplurality of clients disguise the objects on the server as objectimplementations of clients by reading repeatedly transmitted carouseldata, and thus the clients may recover the object implementations. Theobjects of the carousel provide to the clients a method of accessingapplications and contents, which are used by the applications, as if theclients are connected to the server.

The data and the attribute of the U-U object in the object carousel aretransmitted as a message. The message format is described using theBroadcast Inter ORB protocol (BIOP). FIG. 3 illustrates a BIOP messageformat. The BIOP message is formed of a message header 312, a messagedivision header 314, and a message body 316. The message header 312provides information about a BIOP protocol version and a BIOP messagelength. The message division header 314 includes information abouttransmitted objects, for example, object types, such as files, streams,and directories, and object key. The message body 316 includes data ofthe U-U object.

The BIOP message is broadcast in a data carousel module 320. In thiscase, one module 320 is formed of more than one connected BIOP message.Each object in one module 320 is identified by using an object key.According to the DSM-CC data carousel specification, each module isdivided into more than one block. The blocks are transmitted as aDownloadDataBlock (DDB) 330. Each DDB message is sequentiallytransmitted as a type of an MPEG-2 section 340. The block may beobtained directly from TS by using the hardware filter of ademultiplexer. In order to obtain one object from a broadcast network,every module including the object should be obtained. Accordingly, thetransmission parameters of a module, for example, a module version, amodule size, a block size, timing, and a broadcast channel, should beobtained. Since the parameters are transmitted as aDownloadInfoIndication (DII) message, the DII message should be obtainedprior to the module. As a result, the process of obtaining an objectfrom a broadcast network includes obtaining a DII message and modules.

In order to obtain an object transmitted from a broadcasting stream, aDownloadServerInitiate (DSI) message is obtained and aServiceGatewayInfo structure included in the DSI message is interpreted.The DSI message includes information about groups included in a supergroup. In this case, a super group is formed of more than one group, anda group is formed of more than one module.

FIG. 4 illustrates a ServiceGatewayInfo structure grammar.

An object carousel represents a specific service domain, which is a setof DSM-CC U-U objects in a DVB network. The service domain includes aservice gateway, which provides a graph of a service name and an objectname to a receiver.

A client obtains an Inter Operable Reference (IOR) 410, which representsthe location of an object, from the ServiceGatewayInfo. The IOR 410included in the ServiceGatewayInfo comprises the location information ofa route object of an object graph in a ServiceGateway, in other words,one service domain. Since modules including a route object should beobtained to determine the route object of one service domain, a routeobject (BIOP::DirectoryMessage) is obtained by sequentially obtaining aDII message and a DDB message.

FIG. 5 illustrates the type of a DIOP::DirectoryMessage.

The BIOP::DirectoryMessage includes the location, the name, and theattribute of an object, which is included in a route object. An IORfield 510 includes the location information of the object, and anid_data-byte field 520 includes the name information of the object. AnobjectKind_data field 540 includes a value for discriminating the typeof messages, and the BIOP::DirectoryMessage has “dir” according to thevalue.

On the other hand, when the value of the objectKind_data field 540 is“srg”, the message becomes a BIOP::ServiceGateway message having theinformation of an object included in the route object. Accordingly, theBIOP::ServiceGateway message has the same format as theBIOP::DirectoryMessage, except for the value of the objectKind_datafield 540. A serviceContextList_data_byte field 530 of theBIOP::ServiceGateway message may include a CORBA General Inter ORBProtocol (GIOP) code set context structure including information about atransmission code set of a CORBA string. The CORBA GIOP code set contextstructure will be described with reference to FIG. 7.

FIG. 6 illustrates the type of a BIOP::FileMessage.

A BIOP::FileMessage is a data message including a real field content. Aclient obtains a desired object by performing a series of IOR obtainingprocesses.

FIG. 7 is a block diagram of a server 700 according to an exemplaryembodiment of the present invention.

The server 700 includes an image encoder 710 and a sound encoder 720 forencoding data, a multiplexer 730, an RF signal process unit 740, atransmission stream output unit 750, and a CPU 760. The image encoder710 encodes image data and generates image bit streams which areprovided to the multiplexer 730. The sound encoder 720 encodes sounddata and generates sound bit streams which are provided to themultiplexer 730. The multiplexer 730 multiplexes the bit streams encodedin the image encoder 710 and the sound encoder 720 and generates one ormore transmission streams which are provided to the RF signal processunit 740. The signal process unit 740 modulates the transmission streamsinto a signal, which can be output, and provides the signal to thetransmission stream output unit 750. The transmission stream output unit750 transmits the transmission streams. The CPU 760 controls theoperations of each unit and generates object carousel messages, such asa DSI message, a DII message, and a DDB message to be loaded on thetransmission streams. When using a transmission code set other than ISO8859-1 in an object message, the CPU 760 generates aBIOP::ServiceGateway message including the information about atransmission code set.

The transmission of a character string in an object carousel follows theCORBA string, which is defined in the CORBA/IIOP 2.1 specification.Based on the CORBA/IIOP 2.1 specification, when the information aboutthe transmission code is not explained, the CORBA string follows the ISO8859-1 (SIO Latin 1) standard. Accordingly, the DVB-MHP, OCAP, and ACAPusing the object carousel uses the ISO 8859-1 standard as a basictransmission code set for the file names and the directory names. Thus,it is required to transmit the information about the used transmissioncode set in order to use another transmission code set, for example, theUTF-8 transmission code set, in the CORBA string.

A character encoding rule applied to a specific CORBA string instance isdetermined based on the following parameters as to whether a stringinstance is a narrow string or a wide string: the value of a Narrow CharTransmission Code Set (TCS-C), and the value of a Wide Char TransmissionCode Set (TCS-W). When the value of TCS-C is not known, the basic valueof the ISO 8859-1 standard is applied. When the value of TCS-W is notknown, an error occurs due to encoding or decoding a wide string,because a basic value for the TCS-W is absent. The Interface DefinitionLanguage (IDL) representation of a GIOP Code Set Service Contextstructure is as follows.

Module CONV_FRAME { Typedef unsigned long CodeSetId; StructCodeSetContext { CodeSetId char_data; CodeSetId wchar_data; } }

According to the CORBA/IIOP 2.1 specification, the values of the TCS-Cand the TCS-W are allotted by using the GIOP Code Set Service Context.Thus, the GIOP Code Set Service Context structure of the CORBA/IIOP 2.1specification may be selectively inserted to aserviceContextList_data_byte field 530 of the BIOP::ServiceGatewaymessage of the object carousel in order to report the information aboutthe CORBA string transmission code set of the object carousel to aclient. In other words, when using a transmission code set other thanthe ISO 8859-1 standard, for example, the UTR-8 transmission code set,for the CORBA string, the TCS-C value may be set as the UTF-8transmission code set, and the TCS-W value may be set by inserting theundefined GIOP Code Set Service Context structure to theserviceContextList_data_byte field 530 of the BIOP::ServiceGatewaymessage. Moreover, the CORBA strings of the object carousel message maybe interpreted based on the definition of the CORBA in the narrowstring.

FIG. 8 is a block diagram of a client according to an exemplaryembodiment of the present invention.

The client of FIG. 8 is a set top box of data broadcasting. A set topbox 800 includes a system interface 810, a demultiplexer 820, an imagedecoder 830 and a sound decoder 840 as a decoding unit, a CPU 880, amemory 850, an image output unit 860, and a sound output unit 870.

The system interface 810 receives image/sound signals that aretransformed into low frequency signals and modulates the receivedsignals into image/sound signals to be emitted to a TV. In addition, thesystem interface 810 generates a transmission stream by descrambling themodulated image/sound signals and transmits the transmission stream tothe demultiplexer 820. The demultiplexer 820 selects by using a filter apacketized elementary stream (PES) packet corresponding to a programselected by a user from the transmission stream in which a plurality ofPESs are multiplexed. The image decoder 830 and the sound decoder 840decode the PES selected by the demultiplexer 820 to transform thedecoded PES into a type of stream to be emitted. Then, the image decoder830 and the sound decoder 840 output data broadcasting through the imageoutput unit 86 and the sound output unit 870. The memory 850 stores thePES selected by the demultiplexer 820, the decoded image signal, or thedecoded sound signal. The CPU 880 controls the operations of each unitof the set top box 800 and interprets the object carousel messages, forexample, the DSI message, the DII message, and the DBB message,transmitted from a server. More specifically, when the CPU 880 receivesthe BIOP::ServiceGateway message, the CPU 880 fetches the informationabout the transmission code set of the character string used in theobject carousel message from the received BIOP::ServiceGateway messageto decode the character string in the message by using a decodercorresponding to the transmission code set.

Each unit shown in FIGS. 7 and 8 may be realized in a hardware manner ora software manner.

FIG. 9 is a flowchart illustrating a method of sharing information abouta transmission code set according to an exemplary embodiment of thepresent invention.

In operation S910, a server transmits the GIOP code set service contextincluding the information about the transmission code set of the CORBAstring used in an object carousel message by inserting the GIOP code setservice context in a serviceContextList_data_byte field 530 of theBIOP::ServiceGateway message, and a client receives theBIOP::ServiceGateway message in operation S920. In operation S930, a CPU880 of the client fetches the GIOP code set service context from theBIOP::ServiceGateway message to fetch the information about thetransmission code set. In operation S940, the CPU 880 of the clientdecodes pathnames included in the message by using a proper characterdecoder according to the fetched transmission code set information.

While the present invention has been particularly shown and describedwith reference to exemplary embodiments thereof, it will be understoodby those of ordinary skill in the art that various changes in form anddetails may be made therein without departing from the spirit and scopeof the present invention as defined by the following claims.

According to the apparatus and method for signaling a transmission codeset of the present invention, signaling a transmission code set fornaming pathnames is allowed by using various languages in transferringdata about a character encoding system of a pathname in an objectcarousel message.

1. A method of decoding character strings within a message to referencedata, the method comprising: receiving the message to reference the datatransmitted by an object carousel, wherein the message is broadcastinter object request broker (ORB) protocol (BIOP):: ServiceGatewaymessage; extracting from a general inter ORB protocol (GIOP) Code SetService Context in the BIOP::ServiceGateway message, informationregarding an encoding system used to encode the character strings withinthe BIOP message; and decoding the character strings according to theinformation which is extracted, wherein the character strings are commonobject request broker architecture (CORBA) strings defined according toCORBA/IIOP.
 2. The method of claim 1, wherein the object carousel isdefined according to ISO-IEC 13838-6.
 3. The method of claim 1, whereinthe information is expressed in a char_data field of the GIOP Code SetService Context.
 4. The method of claim 3, wherein the information isincluded in the GIOP Code Set Service Context within theBIOP::ServiceGateway message.
 5. The method of claim 4, wherein theinformation indicates that the character strings are encoded based oneither ISO 8859-1 or UTF-8.
 6. The method of claim 5, further comprisingdecoding the character strings based on ISO 8859-1 if the encodingsystem is not explicitly described in the information.
 7. The method ofclaim 6, wherein the GIOP Code Set Service Context for a Wide CharTransmission Code Set is undefined.
 8. The method of claim 7, wherein anwchar_data field is not used to determine the encoding system of thecharacter strings within the message.